Domaine Boris Champy Bourgogne Hautes Cotes de Beaune Bignon 421 2020 (750ml)

 

Domaine Boris Champy

 

Bourgogne Hautes Cotes de Beaune

 

Bignon 421 2020

 

This wine comes from our plot named “En Bignon” in Bouze les Beaune.  Starting from 2020, it is labeled with the name of its location: “En Bignon” and its altitude: 421meters.  The plot’s soil is very clayey and red.  In Burgundy we say that red soil equals great red wine!  Its altitude of 421 meters is important because the plot is in a fresh spot, which is ideal to produce refined wines.  From the vineyard we can see the pass of Bessey en Chaume (532m), highest point in altitude between Paris and Marseille by the highway.

 

Grape Variety:  100% Pinot Noir

 

Appellation:  Bourgogne Hautes-Cotes de Beaune

 

Color:  Red

 

Organic Certified Wine (Ecocert)

 

Biodynamic Certified Wine (Demeter)

 

Tasting & Food Pairings

 

On the nose, as well as on the palate, this wine combines a lovely altitude freshness (fresh red fruit) with a spicy character typical of a fine Pinot Noir.  This wine can be enjoyed as an aperitif with friends but is also at home with charcuterie, shepherd's pie or a vegetable quiche.  Cellaring 3-7 years

 

Winemaking

 

Harvest:  Grapes harvested by hand at perfect maturity. 

 

Vinification:  Gentle extraction, 100% de-stemmed grapes, in oak foudre (large barrel).

 

Ageing:  An average of 12 months, 15% in new barrels.

 

Viticulture

 

Mainly traditional, high density vineyard (8,000 to 10,000 vines per ha with Guyot cane pruning) and partly with lyre (double Guyot pruning)

 

Terroirs

 

This wine comes from our plot named “En Bignon” in Bouze les Beaune.  Starting from 2020, it is labeled with the name of its location: “En Bignon” and its altitude: 421meters.  The plot’s soil is very clayey and red.  In Burgundy we say that red soil equals great red wine!  Its altitude of 421 meters is important because the plot is in a fresh spot, which is ideal to produce refined wines.  From the vineyard we can see the pass of Bessey en Chaume (532m), highest point in altitude between Paris and Marseille by the highway.

 

Vintage:  2020

 

Earliest vintage since 1556

 

After a mild winter, spring is warm and the growth of the vine is very fast.  With the very early flowering (May 20th for the Beaune Vignes Franches) we understand that the harvest will take place in August for ours plots in Beaune.  The weather is very sunny, and very dry throughout July with only 8 mm of rain.  Lucky we get some refreshing rains in August.  This encourage us to extend, a few extra days, the ripening period of the grapes.  We harvest 3 times: August 20th in Beaune (92 days after flowering), early September for our Hautes-Cotes climates, and September the 12th for our Aligoté, which we like to pick nicely golden.

 

The vintage continues the exceptional 2018-2019 series with very good maturity, richness and depth in the wines.  Nature can sometimes surprise us; the white wines have very good levels of acidity and mineral freshness.  You have to go back to 2010 to find white wines with these characteristics.

 

Bourgogne Hautes-Cotes de Beaune

 

Bourgogne-Hautes-Cotes-de-Beaune is a wine region in Burgundy that produces red, rose, and white wines.  Hautes-Cotes means "high slopes," and refers to the high slopes of Beaune where vines are planted.  The region is known for its Pinot Noir and Chardonnay, which produce good-value wines.  The wine region of Bourgogne-Hautes-Cotes-de-Beaune consists of 29 villages and 835 hectares of vineyards.  Vines are planted between 290 and 500 meters above sea level at the base of a limestone cliff that receives plenty of sunlight.  The wine region was granted AOC status in 1961, with strict regulations governing wine quality.  Wines that do not pass the strict test are labeled as Bourgogne wines.

 

 

Domaine Boris Champy Nantoux Bourgogne

 

A pioneer in biodynamic growing in the Hautes-Côtes de Beaune

 

Our Domaine was founded by Didier Montchovet in 1984, when he took out the lease for a tiny 0.5-hectare plot of vines in Nantoux.  From a vigneron family in Nantoux, this young consultant winemaker and wine tasting instructor, worked the vineyards using organic and biodynamic growing methods, listening to and respecting nature.  We are the first wine domaine in Burgundy to have received Demeter biodynamic certification.

 

At a time when people were just starting to re-consider the whole “all chemical” approach, when the concept of terroir and the incalculable value of Burgundy’s Climats were not yet fully appreciated by all, Didier Montchovet was among a small bunch of pioneering producers who were discussing and practicing an eco-friendly and solidarity-driven viticulture that was truly sustainable long before the word became fashionable.  Keen to educate others, they shared their expertise with many other wine estates, both modest and famous, inspiring them to follow this path that respects man in his environment.

 

Over the years, the domaine has expanded its surface area through the purchase of other small plots of vines, but it has retained its roots in Nantoux in the Hautes-Côtes de Beaune.  In around 1990, two large plots covering 5 ha, Montagne de Cras and En Bignon, were planted with Lyre-trained vines.  The original vines had been grubbed up in the 1900s after the Phylloxera crisis so the land had never been treated with chemicals!

 

The Domaine’s wines are now being appreciated by an increasing number of customers, both in France and abroad.  In more challenging years when the weather has not been kind, and in order to protect his business, Didier Montchovet buys in certified organic grapes from some of his fellow winegrowers in terroirs such as Volnay.  Boris Champy continues to buy grapes under the name Petit Aigle.

 

Today, the Domaine extends over around 12 ha with two large areas:

 

• The Hautes-Côtes de Beaune with the Montagne de Cras, Le Clou and En Bignon plots

 

• 3 plots quite close to each other: Pommard En Bœuf and two Beaune 1er Crus: Aux Coucherias and Les Vignes Franches

 

We regard our Domaine as a multitude of small islands of biodiversity, with numerous “clos”, which endow each of our wines with its own personality and identity that we only enhance in the most natural way possible during the vinification process.

 

A new name for the estate

 

With the complete vineyard, winery and inventory takeover, Domaine Didier Montchovet is renamed Domaine Boris Champy.  The small négociant activity “Didier Montchovet wines” takes the new name ‘Petit Aigle” in reference to the majesty of Hautes Cotes, the snake eagle.  To be clear for our consumers, the wines will be labelled: for the estate, Domaine Boris Champy (Biodynamic, certified Demeter) and for the micro-négociant Petit Aigle (Organic, certified Ecocert).

 

Boris Champy

 

An audacious and eco-conscious wine producer

 

Born in 1974, Boris Champy is a native of the Champagne region.  An oenologist by training, he started out working at the Dominus Estate in California’s Napa Valley for 10 years.  He later became technical director for a well-known négociant in Beaune, and then estate manager for the famous Clos des Lambrays in Morey-Saint-Denis.  He was also president of the Corton ODG and responsible for the creation of an environmental protection association.  In his private life, Boris is an accomplished triathlete with a passion for history.

 

Thanks to the people he met and worked with over his formative years, he has not only acquired a comprehensive vine-to-wine expertise, but also an entrepreneurial mindset which led him, midway through his life, to create his own domaine.

 

The Hautes-Côtes

 

Boris Champy believes that the Hautes-Côtes has an exciting future ahead of it, particularly thanks to their altitude within the context of global warming.  Together with the neighbouring winegrowers, he is determined to continue building the reputation of the wines from this superb yet little-known winegrowing region.

 

Domaine Boris Champy’s aim is simple: to showcase the lieux-dits and highlight the different microclimates, exposures and other fascinating subtleties.  In the high-lying hills and valleys of the Hautes-Côtes, Boris practices a viticulture that is still somewhat alien to that of the great winegrowing Côte.  The vineyard plots are small islands of biodiversity with numerous clos as well as trees, quickset hedges, meurgers (thick stone walls) and fruit trees…  Boris knows that one must take a holistic approach, that of an agroecological ecosystem, one that is completely eco-friendly.